like Alban Hythe, no less, not her learned husband.
Narraway wanted Alban to be innocent, as did Maris Hythe, albeit for different reasons. Were they not both reaching too far, grasping for impossible answers and refusing to see what was right in front of them?
She looked at him, breathing in as if to say something else. Then she changed her mind and some of the light faded from her eyes.
Knowing he would regret the words even as he said them, Narraway spoke. “I’ll do all I can to follow this lead, Mrs. Hythe. I shall see Knox straightaway.”
She blinked hard and smiled. “Thank you, Lord Narraway. You are very kind.”
HE DID NOT FEEL kind as he waited for Knox in the police station the following day; in fact, he felt particularly foolish. When Knox finally came in, hot and tired, his boots covered in dust, his face tightened when he saw Narraway.
“I don’t know anything more, my lord.” There were smudges of weariness under his eyes, and when he took his hat off his hair stuck up in spikes. “I can tell you half a dozen places where she met with this Alban Hythe, but I can’t tell you for certain whether it was by accident or arranged.” He put his hat on the hat rack. “They turned up at an awful lot of the same events. Hard to see it as always accidental like. They were things she was interested in, but far as I can tell, he hadn’t been, until he met her.” He sat down heavily in the chair opposite Narraway.
“Do you really think they were having an affair passionate enough to cause him to rape her and beat her like that if suddenly she ended it?” Narraway asked, allowing his doubt to reflect in his expression.
“No,” Knox said frankly. “But somebody raped her. It looks like it’s Alban Hythe, and there’s nothing to show it wasn’t him, except my own feeling that he’s a decent young man. But haven’t you ever been wrong about a gut feeling?”
“Yes,” Narraway admitted. “Sometimes seriously. I suppose you’ve looked into his background? And, also, how on earth did he have time to wander around art galleries and National Geographic luncheons and exhibitions of crafts from God knows where? I certainly don’t!”
“Nor I,” Knox said ruefully. “But I’m not a venture banker with fancy clients to please. And apparently he’s very good at his job indeed.”
Narraway was startled. “Is that what he says he was doing? Taking clients out?”
Knox gave a bitter smile. “Yes. He quite willingly offered me the names of some of the clients concerned, and I contacted them. Of course they didn’t discuss their business, but they affirmed that they had dealings with him, and that they were quite often made in social surroundings—usually over a damn good lunch or dinner. It seems that introductions are made in such places. He mentioned an exhibition of French art, in particular, where certain British investors met with French wine growers, all very casually. Pleasantries were exchanged, and then agreements about very large sums of money were made.”
“That would hardly involve Catherine Quixwood,” Narraway pointed out. “It could be an explanation for one or two meetings, not more.”
“Three or four maybe,” Knox corrected. “Quixwood himself is one of the investors.”
Narraway was puzzled. He could not see how this explained what appeared to be a very personal friendship with Catherine. Unless, of course, Maris Hythe’s extraordinary idea had some truth in it?
He pursued it with Knox because he very much wanted an answer that exonerated Catherine from any type of wrongdoing, and Alban Hythe as well. He acknowledged to himself that he also was angry enough, wounded enough, that he wanted someone to be provably in the wrong. He needed someone to be punished for the pain and the humiliation she had suffered.
“What does Quixwood say of him?” he asked aloud.
“Nice young man, and good at his job—in fact, gifted at it,” Knox replied unhappily. “He seemed very distressed at the thought that Hythe could be guilty.” He sighed. “It would be a very personal kind of betrayal, both for Quixwood, and for Mrs. Hythe. But then rape is, when the people know each other. I sometimes wonder which is worse, to be attacked so intimately by a complete stranger, or by someone you had trusted.”
“But you still don’t think Hythe is guilty?” Narraway pressed again.
Knox looked up again, meeting Narraway’s eyes. “Have you ever been really surprised by who was a traitor,